[ubuntu-art] Quick question for the WIKI regarding the range of what constitutes a "theme"

[Kenneth Wimer]

On Friday 11 July 2008 01:09:09 Andrea Cimitan wrote:
<snip>...</snip>
> The community here in the mailing list is completely unofficial and in most
> case its mockups are ignored.

If they had more bearing on what is actually possible I think that they would 
see much more acceptance by developers who could/would/should implement it. 
Long term goals and mockups are one thing, dealing with the current system 
and planning for the future while trying to improve the system itself is the 
real goal, I think.

From an artist perspective it is always a drag to have a good idea and be 
told "it'll never happen" but my experience has shown that sometimes that is 
simply how it is. There are some lengths you can go to to change things and 
sometimes the best ideas are the ones that nobody has thought of before and 
are easily reailzable but more often than not, people think up stuff that 
might look awesome on a screenshot and very well might be the "next big 
thing" but without a team of developers *and* upstream support it'll never 
happen. Let's not forget that this is the art list and not necessarily the UI 
list.

If you ask me, we should work at getting the most out of what is there first, 
which would build trust in the team, which would lead to more people helping, 
etc. There is a way to get this all done, no matter how far fetched it may 
seem but the crazier the idea, the more work it is and the longer it will 
take. Let's get some things straight first and work in an orderly manner to 
really improve things.

> Even though at the same time it is the right place to propose your work, so
> if you have time and you have something original in your mind -you should
> really- post it here (why not contribute if you have a great idea? why
> don't share it with the developers?).
>
> Also, as said by kenneth, ten thousands of mockups full of transparency and
> mac-like nautilus are completely useless.
>
> From my point of view, one thing that could be done to have a higher
> quality community contribution is
> 1) don't threat the mailing list as a chat
> 2) use it to ask help, not to ask opinions (hey do you like my
> fancy-new-ultra theme?)
> 3) merge guys, teams, then let's order the work in the wiki, doing real
> stuff and not mockups

Indeed the mailing list is becoming a problem for those who really work on 
specific issues. I'll be announcing some new stuff soon, mainly a -dev list 
which will reduce the noise level for those who contribute actively. More on 
this soon.

--
Ken